But they're much less likely to use screen time for social media or email.

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TUESDAY, Feb. 14, 2012 (HealthDay News) —
When given the opportunity to have screen time, children with autism
spectrum disorders typically choose television and video games over
social interactive media, such as email, a new study finds.

The preoccupation with video games could interfere with the children's
socialization and learning, warned the researchers, whose study appears online
in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders.

Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by problems
with social interaction, communication and restricted interests and behaviors.
Autism spectrum disorders, or ASDs, include Asperger syndrome, which is a
milder form of autism.

In conducting the study, the researchers analyzed information on
more than 1,000 teens in special education classes, including those with autism
spectrum disorders, learning and intellectual disabilities, and speech
problems.

About 60 percent of the teens with autism spectrum disorders spent
most of their time watching TV or videos, the investigators found.

"This rate appears to be high, given that among typically
developing adolescents, only 28 percent have been shown to be 'high users' of
television," Paul Shattuck, an assistant professor at the Brown School at
Washington University in St. Louis, said in a university news release. "Television viewing
is clearly a preferred activity for children with ASDs, regardless of symptoms,
functional level or family status."

Moreover, 41 percent of the teens with autism spent most of their
free time playing video games, the study authors found.

"Given that only 18 percent of youths in the general
population are considered to be high users of video games, it seems reasonable
to infer based on the current results, that kids with ASDs are at significantly
greater risk of high use of this media than are youths without ASDs,"
Shattuck added.

In contrast, the teens with autism spectrum disorders were less
likely to use email or social media.

"We found that 64.4 percent of youth with ASDs did not use
email or chat at all," Shattuck said. "Kids with speech and language
impairments and learning disabilities were about two times more likely to use
email or chat rooms than those with ASDs."

He noted, however, use of social media increased among the teens
with autism spectrum disorders as they got older and their cognitive
skills improved. Cognitive is a word used to describe brain-based
functions such as memory, thinking, learning and processing information.

"This proclivity for screen time might be turned into
something we can take advantage of to enhance social skills and learning
achievement, especially [with] recent innovations in devices like iPads,"
Shattuck suggested.

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